Frotter
by Noisseau
Summary: Enjoyment is not a goal, it is a feeling that accompanies important ongoing activity -- Paul Goodman


Title- Frotter  
  
Author- Noisseau--imhis1in5billion@hotmail.com  
  
Rating- G  
  
Spoilers- Redux II  
  
Keywords- Mulder/Scully Romance  
  
Summary- "Enjoyment is not a goal, it is a feeling that accompanies important ongoing activity."  
--Paul Goodman--  
  
**********  
  
Frotter  
  
**********  
  
Washington Square Hotel  
New York City, NY  
November 21, 1997  
Room 138  
  
  
  
For once, the bed didn't creak loudly when Special Agent Fox Mulder plopped down on it. In fact, it was one of the most comfortable mattresses he'd ever lain on--not that he'd lain on many. The soft, blue comforter and the springy mattress were a far cry from his bedraggled leather couch. Come to think of it, the entire hotel room was much more ostentatious than any he and his partner, Dana Scully, had ever stayed in.  
  
Fox groaned as he brought his feet up over his prostrate body to remove the painfully constricting shoes. He grunted loudly, pulling at his footwear, thus failing to hear Dana open the door to their adjoining rooms.  
  
She had trouble containing her laughter at this unusual view of her partner, as she walked over to him. Fox looked up, startled at the movement he could see through his uplifted legs. "Don't you ever knock, Scully?" he asked with a tired smile and sat up.  
  
Still trying to get control of her silent giggles, Dana had to pause before answering. "Let me be the first to assure you that it was definitely a Kodak moment." She smirked.  
  
"So what's up, Scully?" he asked, eyeing her sweat pants and t-shirt.  
  
Raising a practiced eyebrow at his scrutiny, she replied, "I'm going for a swim, Mulder, and then I'm going to take full advantage of the Bureau's hospitality--manicure, pedicure, full-body massage; the works." She grinned mischievously. "The fact that you're doing the expense reports this month just makes it all worthwhile."  
  
He groaned and flopped back on the bed, still looking up at her. "I think you enjoy torturing me, Scully!"  
  
"You're just so easy, Mulder," she said matter-of-factly.  
  
Mulder lowered he voice. "Are you coming on to me, Scully?" he whispered seductively.  
  
"In your dreams, Mulder," she replied, a smile in her voice.  
  
Fox waited until the door clicked shut before he whispered, "How right you are, Agent Scully."  
  
**********  
  
Mulder's Room  
  
  
  
*Click* Old Japanese kung fu movie. *Click* Home Shopping Network. *Click* Bambi. Mulder smirked, remembering a certain etymologist. He sighed and turned the television off. He lay quietly on the cushy bed listening to the TV pop and click as it cooled, his boredom steadily growing. "Scully's probably having more fun than I am right now," he said morosely to himself.  
  
Then, a smile slowly spread across his face, and he leapt off the bed. Fox quickly changed into his bathing suit, profoundly glad he'd opted for something more modest than his small, red Speedo. He slipped on a t-shirt and shoes and grabbed a towel. "Ready or not, partner, here I come!" He smiled and walked out the door.  
  
**********  
  
Health Club & Spa  
  
  
  
Mulder had to show the attendant his room key before he was allowed to enter the pool area. Pushing open the glass door, he paused and took in the almost deserted pool deck and weight room. A rather chubby, bald man was swimming laps (or at least trying to). A silver-haired woman lounged in the whirlpool, as a young woman--she looked like a teenager--moved steadily up and down on a stair-step machine.  
  
Mulder's face fell in disappointment--Scully was nowhere in sight. Then his eye caught a sign on a door at the far end of the room: "Massage Parlor" it said. Grinning mischievously, he walked purposefully toward the portal, listening to the soft music pouring through it. The sound covered any noise Mulder might have made as he pushed the door open.  
  
He lay his towel on the chair and padded softly up to the masseur. The muscular man, who was vigorously rubbing oil into his hands, looked up to see a tall man with a silencing finger held to his lips and holding up a badge.  
  
"Bubba the Masseur" squinted at the bold letters--FBI--and then at Mulder. Fox pointed at his own chest, and then at Dana who was lying facedown on the table.  
  
"Bubba" smiled and nodded as if things like that happened every day, then pointed the stranger to the bottle of oil. As Fox was rubbing his hands with it, Dana spoke up, "You almost ready, Vince?" Her voice was muffled in the hollow her head rested in.  
  
Mulder turned to Vince expectantly. The man cleared his throat. "Uh, yeah Dana. I'm ready now." He caught the maniacal glint in Mulder's eye just before Fox turned toward his partner's prostrate body. Dana lay with her arms at her sides and a towel wrapped around her waist. Seeing her sans clothing, albeit facedown made him flush a little with embarrassment, but after a moment's hesitation, he moved forward determinedly.  
  
**********  
  
Scully tried to wait patiently as Vince prepared for the massage, but her muscles were screaming for a release from the aching tension that the last case had brought on. Dealing with Mulder when he was in "profiler mode" always made her afraid for him and produced a lot of stress. She was startled out of her reverie by the soft, warm hands that placed themselves on her shoulders. She sighed contentedly as they began to knead her aching muscles into lumps of useless, but contented tissue. What she assumed were Vince's hands moved in strong motions, slowly unknotting and soothing her tired shoulders and arms before migrating to her back.  
  
Dana had almost regained all of the weight she'd lost during her cancer, but her ribs still stood out under her pale skin. His fingers rubbed the rose oil into her back as he kneaded her spine, continuing outward toward her sides and downward onto her lower back. Those hands left her feeling somewhat less stable than Jell-O.  
  
**********  
  
Mulder's slow ministrations were beginning to relax him almost as much as they did Dana. He concentrated wholly on relieving her tension, thereby relieving his own. He grimaced as he ran his hands over her prominent ribcage. //She's so thin// he thought, for a moment reliving the anguish he'd felt during her cancer. His expression softened as he mentally added, //And she's still so beautiful.// The scent of the rose oil mixed with her lavender shampoo and the other unnamed smell he had always associated with her to create a heady fragrance in his nostrils.  
  
Fox ran his hands over her smoothly muscled arms, kneading her deltoids and triceps and then moving down to her forearms. Next, he gave his attention to her own strong hands, massaging each finger individually and caressing her palms with his thumbs.  
  
"You'd be a millionaire you bottled your technique, Vince," he heard her mumble.  
  
Mulder looked up at Vince, urging him with his eyes to answer her.  
  
The masseur seemed to come awake from a trance. "I do what I can, Dana," he spoke from her shoulder. Mulder nodded at him and raised his eyebrows, soliciting Vince to continue. "So, Dana," the big man began, "what brought you to the Big Apple?"  
  
"Um--" she grunted, trying to pay more attention to the conversation than the hands soothing her body. "My partner and I came here on a case. We're FBI agents," she hastened to explain.  
  
Vince whistled in awe. "We get a lot of government types up here, but never FBI! So, uh, where's your partner?" he asked casually, trying to hide the knowing smirk that spread across his face.  
  
"Oh, I guess he's up in his room watching TV." She giggled as Mulder 'accidentally' dug his fingers into her tickle spot. "Careful or I might have to retaliate," she said with a smile in her voice  
  
Vince continued, "Are male/female partnerships commonplace?"  
  
"There are a few, but there isn't a large percentage of women in the Bureau in the first place. Anyway, it's old boys' club mostly. That's part of why I joined, to make a difference. Beside," she chuckled, "I don't think most guys could handle having a woman partner. That's not only because of the close conditions, but also because the 'boys' often dismiss women as weak, or something to that effect."  
  
Mulder hesitated in his massage, anxious to hear if she would say anything about him. "My partner isn't like that though," she continued. "Mulder wouldn't intentionally hurt me for anything, and I know he respects me. I trust him with my life," she said simply as he worked his way around her shoulder blades. Dana's voice lilted affectionately as she spoke of him. "Don't get me wrong, he can be a complete jerk sometimes, but he always makes up for it." She paused and moved in for the kill. "Sometimes I wish there had been iced tea in that bag."  
  
Mulder's breath caught in his throat, as Vince looked up at him confused. "Huh?" the Arnold-Schwarzenegger-wanna-be asked dumbly.  
  
"Oh, sorry--never mind. All I mean," she paused for effect, "is that I love him." Mulder's heart stopped.  
  
**********  
  
Dana was more relaxed that she had been in a very long time--at least since the cancer. //I could get used to these hands; Mulder has the most amazing hands.// She had to stifle the giggle that bubbled up in her throat. //I might be persuaded to let him do this to me everyday!// She smiled, concentrating on the feel of his long, elegant fingers moving gently over her skin. //But why stop there? Who knows what these hands could do!//  
  
Scully had known almost from the beginning that it was Mulder and not Vince who was kneading her back. She had noticed immediately when the real masseuse's voice had emanated from the wrong side of the table relative to where "his" arms extended from. And, she thought, it was just like her partner to play this kind of "joke" on her. The opportunity to both play with his mind *and* make her feelings for him known was just too good to resist.  
  
Dana gauged her confession as a success when she felt his breath on her back become shallow and his hands stop dead in their tracks. She grinned victoriously. //Your move.//  
  
**********  
  
Mulder had the over whelming urge to wiggle his finger in his ear. His mind seemed to have shut down, just as his breathing had ceased. Abruptly, a deluge of thoughts overcame him. //Did she just say what I think she said!?!?!? Love? ME?!// He felt like crying and laughing at the same time; it was as if a great weight had been lifted off of his back. Mulder wanted to hug and kiss her and hold her--the one person who had ever loved him without reservation.  
  
He realized that he must have been grinning like an idiot, even as tears ran freely down his face. But before he could stop them, Fox felt the wetness fall on his hands and onto her back. He reluctantly removed his hands from her body and wiped his face happily with the sleeve of his t-shirt.  
  
**********  
  
Waiting for his response was almost unbearable. She wasn't worried about whether or not he loved her; she'd known his feelings for a long time. In the beginning of their partnership, he had been crazy and confrontational. It had become clear to her that first night in Oregon that Fox Mulder had been hurt too many times in his life for him to trust anyone easily. But from the first, she had given him what he craved most--her attention, her acceptance of him if not his theories, her loyalty, and her friendship. Scully had worked her way quickly and inexplicably into his heart and had begun the slow process of healing his broken heart.  
  
She had begun to need him just as he had needed her from the start, until the two of them together were the most formidable threat ever to the Consortium's power. But although Dana was sure of his love for her, she also knew that Mulder would doubt his own worth to be loved. He often wallowed in his own guilt and self-recrimination over all of the hurt that had happened to those he loved--especially to Scully. Then she felt his warm tears falling onto her skin, and his hands disappear to wipe them away from his face. She waited breathlessly for his response.  
  
**********  
  
Fox looked around for Vince, suddenly remembering his presence and embarrassed that he would witness this intimate moment. But the masseur had apparently slipped out, leaving the two to their revelations. All at once, he felt no need to hide his weeping, and he let out a happy sob, bending down to kiss her between the shoulder blades.  
  
Dana turned over, bringing the towel along to cover her nakedness, and looked up at Mulder's smiling face concernedly. She brought her hand up to his wet face and cupped his cheek, stroking his eyebrow with her thumb. "Are you alright, Mulder? I meant what I said," she tried to reassure him.  
  
He caressed her face with his watery gaze, and his grin widened as he saw the truth of her declaration laid bare in her eyes. Fox swallowed the lump in his throat. "I don't understand how you could love me after all the pain I've caused you--" She started to protest, but Fox silenced her by brushing his fingers lightly across her lips. "--But I think that *that* is the truth that will save us."  
  
Mulder smiled as he saw the tears come to her eyes, and leaned down to kiss each lid lingeringly. He showered her face with soft, loving kisses, mingling their tears together, but he had yet to make contact with her lips. Fox hovered over her for a moment, breathing in her breath and gazing into her eyes. "I love you, Dana, period; no ifs, ands, or buts."  
  
She ran her fingers through his silky hair and said, smirking, "Ditto, Mulder."  
  
He gazed intently at her, stroking her cheekbones, her eyebrows, her lips. "Say it, Dana," he whispered haltingly.  
  
She looked up at him wonderingly. "I love you, Mul--"  
  
"No," he cut her off gently, tears again pooling in his eyes. "Say m-my name," his voice broke.  
  
Dana's eyes filled with understanding along with her tears. "I--love--you--Fox!" she whispered emphatically.  
  
Mulder closed his eyes, squeezing out hot tears as the final barrier between them was obliterated. He wrapped his long arms around her body and hugged her fiercely to him, stroking her bare back softly and breathing in her sweet smell.  
  
Dana caressed his muscled shoulders and played with the short hairs at the back of his neck. She kissed his temple and pulled him up to look at her. Mulder wasted no time in pressing his lips to hers, at first tentatively, but then with both tenderness and passion. When they finally broke apart for lack of air, he again pulled her body against his in a loving and desperate embrace. Fox trailed his lips along her slender neck, seemingly unable to get enough of her. "Thanks," he whispered, his warm breath tickling her ear.  
  
She had to force her mind away from the feel of his touch for a moment to comprehend the many meanings of that simple word. Dana Scully had given Fox Mulder the thing that he wanted and needed most. It wasn't his sister any more--Samantha hadn't believed in him, hadn't trusted him. She had run away from him. But Scully had run to him with open arms. She'd long ago accepted the guilt-laden, sad-eyed, tender-hearted wreck that he was; and not only had she picked up the shards of his broken heart, but the was now the glue that held those pieces together. Dana knew all of this, and as they sat there in various states of undress, they were more than content just holding each other, the battle for love won and their demons held at bay. "Any time, partner," she answered. "Any time."  
  
**********  
  
  
Well?!?!?! Feel free to make comments or suggestions ;-)  
  
**********  
  
"If you're living like there is no God, you had better be right"  
  
  
"He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to gain what he  
cannot lose."  
--Jim Elliot, missionary--  
  
  
"Character is sticking to a decision after the emotion is gone"  
  
  
"Friendship is love without his wings."  
--Lord Byron--  
  
  
Scully: "I want to talk to him."  
Dr: "No! He's a danger to anyone."  
Scully: "Not to me!!"  
  
  
Mulder: "Admit it, you just want to play house! Woman get back  
in here and make me a sandwich! Did I not make  
myself clear?" 


End file.
